Editorial: Let Wall Street Neighborhood Association be heard

The Wall Street Theater, which remains open, declared bankruptcy after legal wrangling with builders who helped renovate the historic theater.

The Wall Street Theater, which remains open, declared bankruptcy after legal wrangling with builders who helped renovate the historic theater.

Photo: Erik Trautmann / Hearst Connecticut Media

Editorial: Let Wall Street Neighborhood Association be heard

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A year ago almost to the day we wrote on The Norwalk Hour’s editorial page: “After decades of decay, false starts and stagnation, things are finally looking up for downtown Norwalk.”

Among other harbingers, we cited the imminent opening of the historic Wall Street Theater, the soon-to-be resurrected mixed-use development known as Wall Street Place, and the long overdue renovation of a fire-damaged eyesore at 45 Wall St., which housed two restaurants and 10 apartments.

Could a Wall Street Train Station be far behind, we asked.

Unfortunately, yes. It could.

Projects that began with high hopes have sputtered to a halt. Less than a year after it opened, the Wall Street Theater, the presumptive jewel in the neighborhood’s crown, filed for bankruptcy to protect its assets from legal actions taken by companies claiming to be owed a collective $15 million. They include Morganti Group, the Danbury-based construction firm that served as the theater’s general contractor.

While thus far the show has gone on, the first few months of 2018 netted the theater just $13,000, raising doubts about its viability. Meanwhile, a tech and innovation center planned for next door has been scrapped by Connecticut Public Television.

The renovations of 45 Wall St., begun after the city threatened the owner with a blight warning six years ago, continues to be marked by false starts and delays, much like the rebirth of the neighborhood itself. The building was extensively damaged in 2010 by arson, forcing tenants to jump to safety from the second and third floors.

Finally, the first phase of Wall Street Place — 101 apartments, 15,500 square feet of retail, and the state’s first automated parking garage — has languished half-built on the former Isaac Street parking lot for more than a year and a half.

Work stopped on the Tyvek-wrapped box, now owned by Citibank, over finance issues between the bank and the city’s chosen developer, POKO Partners. The project took nearly a decade to break ground only to grind to a halt a year later.

Common Council member Doug Hempstead attributes the difficulties of finding a new developer to high costs. No further information has been forthcoming from the mayor’s office, the city having signed a nondisclosure agreement with Citibank.

Into this quagmire comes the Wall Street Neighborhood Association, a newly formed group of stakeholders seeking involvement in decisions affecting the neighborhood. As one member told The Norwalk Hour on a walking tour of the stalled Wall Street Place, “We have to live with this.”

The group wants to work with Mayor Harry Rilling and others to help get the project back on track. Rilling says the nondisclosure precludes him from giving the association a seat at the table, but that he welcomes their input.

He should. The neighbors — like all Norwalk taxpayers — deserve transparency, as opposed to an information blackout. Despite all that’s happened — and all that hasn’t — the association remains “very enthusiastic about the long-term prospects of the Wall Street area…”